


Trial

by ottermo



Series: As Prompted [6]
Category: Humans (TV)
Genre: Gen, but that is not a requirement, could be read with Leotilda goggles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-27
Updated: 2016-12-27
Packaged: 2018-09-12 17:27:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9082306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ottermo/pseuds/ottermo
Summary: Fill #10 for 'the' Humans fanwork challenge on tumblr. Written before series 2, so no ties to Niska's canonical trial.





	

**Author's Note:**

> if you follow me on tumblr, you've probably already been subjected to these fills, I'm just transferring them to here because my ao3 account was looking annoyingly under-representative of the amount of Humans obsessing I do on a daily basis.

 

Mattie spends her first day in court just a little bit wonderstruck.

All those years of grudging farewells and bitter reproaches when Laura arrived home, days later than she’d planned, and Mattie had never really stopped to consider that her mother was actually _good_ at her job. Really, really good. Of course, there’s some element of bias here - Mattie’s already on the Elsters’ side, she doesn’t need convincing of their authenticity, their nature, their right to exist. But even among this morning’s head-shakers, Mattie can now spot those who are coming around, beginning to see the truth. And some of it’s to do with Mia’s testimony, of course, but a lot of it is to do with her mother.

Like a light dawning, Mattie realises what this feeling is: she is proud. Proud to be her mother’s daughter, proud of what she has inherited, proud of everything her mother was before her, and still is. 

It’s a good feeling. She’d like to keep it. 

She spends her second day in court filled with anger. The opposition is so closed-minded, so manipulative, knows all the right questions to ask Niska to reveal what they call her aggressive side, her violent streak - all things, Mattie screams inside her head, that _prove_ what she is. That prove she has the right to be free. 

Then they call Max to the stand, last-minute, and Mattie hates the rule that says Synths can be called without notice because she can see how scared he is, even from up here on the balcony, and if the judge and jury can’t see it too then they’re blind as well as stupid - they aren’t looking, they aren’t _feeling_. Thankfully, nothing they can coax out of Max is anything less than what he is: exemplary. Angelic. Humble, and honest, and loyal through and through. 

Naturally, they use this to argue that he is only half a person. That his purity is proof of incompletion. Mattie seethes.

She spends her third day in court listening in fascination: finally, she gets to hear Fred’s side of the story, from his point of view. Her mother leads him perfectly to all the right points, her questions revealing the atrocity of Hobb’s acts without once painting Fred as a helpless object - rather, as a person wronged. 

Fred is a man of few words, as far as Mattie has known until now, but under Laura’s guidance he becomes a wordsmith, expounds what really happened, drags empathy and anguish out of even the sternest frowns. When the first break is called, Mattie counts five sets of dampened cheeks in the jury; one man is still writing furiously in his notebook, and the woman on the end of the first row is shaking her head, one hand on her heart, full of pain for him. 

Later, as his story draws to a close, Mattie realises that her own face is tear-stained too, but can’t bring herself to look away from Fred to look for something to dry it with. When he finally stands down, Mattie steals a sideways glance at her father, sees him affected as well. How far they’ve come, all of them.  

Mattie spends her fourth day in court with her eyelids hanging heavy - the opposition rolls out page after page of old, out-of-date research, stating the many impossibilities, the fundamental failures, the years of fruitless endeavour. None of it relevant here: none of it is David Elster’s. Conveniently, they have struck him from the scientific record. 

Their ignorance is draining, and Mattie barely slept the night before, knowing the verdict is drawing closer. She feels herself fading at the edges, and she’s grateful when Harun nudges her, stirs her into full wakefulness. It’s his first day here, and he hasn’t missed a word. Mattie feels like a veteran in comparison. 

They call Karen that afternoon. It doesn’t go as badly as Mattie had feared: though she still hesitates to say that her claim to life is rightful, she doesn’t denounce David’s work outright, or his other creations. The opposing party wants more from her, but Karen doesn’t give it. Mattie’s heart goes out to the woman in the stand, sees for several moments a stray, who’s only been looking for somewhere to belong, all this time.

Mattie hopes she will find it soon.

She begins her fifth day in court with trepidation: unless the judge calls for some kind of extension, today may be the final one. Mattie takes her seat, Toby on one side and Joe on the other - tries to catch her mother’s eye, but Laura is reading through her notes for the fiftieth time, saying something quietly to Fiona, the Asian woman sitting with her. Though not as impassioned, Fiona’s work on the case has been invaluable to them. It impresses Mattie all over again, to think that her mother’s belief in this cause is strong enough that her colleagues will follow her like this, stake their careers on what might be the most groundbreaking trial they’ll ever be part of. 

The judge calls to order, and Mattie sits up straight, following each speaker with her eyes. When Laura summons Leo, he walks to the stand like he’s going there to be hanged, and Mattie wills him to be more confident, to make more of a show of conviction. He glances up at her, and she raises her eyebrows in a challenge. _Come on. Let’s see what charm school has made of you_.

Perhaps it works. Perhaps it is nothing to do with her. But he stands taller when Laura begins her questions, his blue eyes bright with truth.

Like Fred, he brings the room to tears. There’s something about the way he tells it, raw, as though for the first time, and Mattie realises, all over again, how difficult it must have been, telling her, back at the start. As if in recognition of it, he speaks some of it now to her directly, and she can only hope it makes it easier for him. 

Laura has both his birth and death certificates in her hands, and she holds them up like a collage of a life. She gestures towards the man in the stand, so clearly alive, but whatever she says, Mattie barely hears it. She’s watching Leo, confronting his death in this public forum, sees it hit him in a new way, deep and sharp. _You’re alive_ , she reminds him silently, through the air. _You’ve made it all this way. Don’t you dare fall to pieces now._

He does not. If anything, he comes together. 

Laura finishes her questions, dismisses him. As if released from her spell, Leo scuttles back to his chair, between Mia and Max. He looks up at Mattie again, and gives her the smallest of smiles. It is easy to return it. 

More back-and-forth, more minor statements. More hoop-jumping and formalities and discrepancies and proofs. Then the judge turns to his jurymen, and asks them for their decision: to vindicate the Elsters, or destroy them. To find them innocent of the crime of humanity, or else blessedly, blessedly guilty. 

In the silence, Mattie closes her eyes. She hopes they choose right. 

 


End file.
